Codex Teenage Premonition

Oddly compiled record draws on the Scottish post-punk band's live recordings and sessions.

The past few years have seen the story of the post-punk era continually rewritten, as increasing numbers of bands are delivered from obscurity into the hands of reissue-hungry hipsters. With the release of last year's Codex Teenage Premonition, add Scotland's Fire Engines to the list of post-punk acts basking in the glow of renewed interest.

Formed in 1979, the Fire Engines counted Josef K and Orange Juice among their domestic contemporaries, but their penchant for furious noise and repetition placed them closer to England's Swell Maps or even American No Wave than the Postcard sound. Neither their debut LP, Lubricate Your Living Room, nor the comprehensive compilation of their studio output, Fond, have been in print for more than a decade, so the band's legacy seemed destined to be forgotten. But then in 2004, Franz Ferdinand-- who clearly learned a thing or two about angular guitar riffs and self-deprecating lyrics from the Fire Engines-- tapped the band to open for them on tour. The pairing resulted in a split 7" in which Franz Ferdinand covered the Engines' first single, "Get Up and Use Me", while the reunited Fire Engines turned in a deranged rendition of Franz Ferdinand's "Jacqueline". At times unrecognizable, the Engines' version threatens to totally fall apart, mocking the airtight performance of the original with a haphazard looseness.

Comprised of live performances (some of which were recorded by fans), Codex Teenage Premonition would be entirely superfluous were it not for the fact that the rest of the band's catalogue remains out of print. The band is captured in blisteringly raw form, but without studio polish or proper mixing, we get an extreme picture of the mechanics of the band: fat bass grooves; thin, piercingly hot guitar stabs; and David Henderson's nasal yelps. The sound quality is frustratingly poor throughout, which makes the three bonus tracks particularly redemptive. In addition to "Jacqueline", the disc includes two strong tracks taken from a 1981 Peel Session. "Discord", which unnecessarily appears three times on the album, is a hypnotically rhythmic workout that boasts a simple, but circuitously fluid bass line and some James White-esque skronk. "Candyskin" is the Fire Engines' lone bid for pop stardom, plodding along with the cocksure swagger of the Voidoids and icing the cake with a giddy coda of la la la's.

Codex Teenage Premonition is hardly a definitive introduction. But armed with some ragged snapshots of the band live and two excellent Peel outtakes (which will soon be released as a 7" single), it still makes a strong case for the Fire Engines' inclusion in the periphery of the ever-expanding post-punk canon. But it will take some long overdue reissues of their studio output to elevate them above also-rans.